Unbillievable

Did they show the Falls tonight? You know, going to or coming back from commercial? It’s an open invitation for anyone too weak to stay on board. They should have given directions to get there, just so we can all go hurl ourselves into the Gorge.

Listen, I’m not going to sit here and BS with you guys, because you know what you saw. There were a lot of good things we saw from the Bills tonight, and a whole lot of bad. We also saw that America’s Team has a lot of questions to answer next weekend against the New England Monster, and anyone who thinks Romo is the second coming should check their Bible again.

We all saw it, and we all felt it. The question is, are you still willing to do it? Are two humongous punches to the stomach enough for you to hang up the towel and move on to hockey season? From my view, I wouldn’t blame you if you shut it down now. I’m certainly not condoning it, but what else can you do if you’ve had your fill five weeks in?

I only bring it up because no one shut it down out in those seats tonight. If you were in that crowd you know exactly what I mean. I hope you felt it on TV, because that was the loudest I’ve heard the Ralph in years. We stood the entire game, made noise every down, and never lost thirst for an upset. Every single Bills fan in that place forgot the standings tonight and put on a show on national television. It was beautiful, and made me proud of this area and the fans.

The on field result, however, is what makes our reputation ring true. They don’t make commercials like this for just any team, and Dick Jauron did just enough to keep the universe in balance.

Listen, there are at least a half dozen times this game was won, and for everyone a different play will stand out. The fact of the matter is those players did everything they could to win that game, and the Cowboys did everything they could to give it to us. How we sit at a 25-24 final is just mind boggling, and when I think mind boggling, I think Dick Jauron and company.

Trent Edwards made four major mistakes tonight. Two were sacks, one was a fumble he recovered, and the fourth was an interception that wouldn’t have happened if they don’t call a five wide out package in field goal range. I know some people think otherwise, but there is a time to be aggressive, and a time to run the ball and make it a two score game. A half dozen decisions like this make the difference in a game’s end result, and each one tonight went against us.

This isn’t an aberration. Opening day our loss was a result of the same type of miscues, and to be quite honest, these decisions are balls. I highly doubt DiGorgio is the one who decided to play off late when the Cowboys needed a mid range sideline completion, nor did Schobel plead for a minimal rush on a quarterback who was flustered all night.

I guess in the end it doesn’t matter. A bounce here, a stumble there, and we are 3-2 at the bye with a defense beginning to mesh and an offense doing just enough to win. Instead we are a 1-4 team devastated by injuries and an incompetence that saturates every genuinely outstanding effort this team puts forth.

There are no answers, only the question of whether you have enough in the tank to be there for the next eleven games. Tonight, for both for fans and this team, will either be the turning point of the season, or the pinnacle of our disastrous fate.

My heart says it’s worth it, but on nights like this, my mettle is rocked to its very core.

I’ve been awake since 5:00am. I went to bed at 2:00. Since then, my mind has been a whirlwind. But it isn’t bad. Somehow I can only see good. Maybe I’m wrong, but I guess you never can be too wrong when trying to help others see the good in something. I’ll try to touch on everything I’ve been thinking…but I may miss something here and there. And I guess it’s also fair to say this impending tangent may make absolutely no sense…but it has to come ut of me somehow.

First of all, I am not a very good sports fan. I’d like to believe I’m a pretty okay Sabres fan, an almost bandwagoner Red Sox fan, and a new Bills fan. When I was younger, my family and I would watch Bills games. (My dad actually had a sporting goods store at the time, so my brother and I had a lot of Buffalo sports wear…) We made chicken wings. We made pizza. We watched the Bills. We were Western New Yorkers, just like everybody else. I think the turning point was when my Grandpa died. He and my Gram used to come over to watch the games, and I don’t think we’d watched much since his death. Although, he died in 1993, and if I’m not mistaken, we may have just been bandwagoners. Everyone is a bandwagoner, really. All that matters to me is that you don’t hop off…Anyway. After about 1993, I don’t remember watching football. I also didn’t know much about it. I did, however, watch hockey. My entire family loveloveLOVES hockey, and I don’t know where we’d be without it. Needless to say, I never felt much want outside of a sheet of ice, and actually have been up since 5:00am because of hockey practice. But you know what? People put themselves through these things because they love it. I truly believe that sports feelings are the second strongest set of feelings any real sports fan can have, aside from the grouping of family/closefriends/lovers. I would put it above religion. Know why? Because I’ve never believed in something more. Never. Religion has always seemed silly to me. I think the bible is fiction, and I’m not sure I would want to spend a dollar towards Catholic charities, just to wear a pair of jeans to school. Aside from any religious feelings though (which is an entirely different story…), I believe in sports. Furthermore, I believe in Buffalo sports. Someone told me once, that you only believe in something when you’ve given up on rationalizing. I think this is true, because reason tells you to run the hell away from Buffalo sports, and settle into something safer, like being a nomadic bandwagoner.

Last night, I saw one hell of an offensive defense, and a scared kid trying to execute plays in his second NFL start. On my life, I told my roommate “This isn’t right. They’re going to get a score, miss the two point conversion, and then kick a field goal.” History dictates. I live here: http://youtube.com/watch?v=Wii6vHBSiP4 . Aside from feeling the outcome in my gut, I saw an amazing community, trying to keep their team going. I watched fracture the other night, and someone (in the movie) said that when people go into comas, you should read to them, and talk to them to help them overcome it. I’m sure that went on with Everett. You have to will some things to reality sometimes. Trying to will a win out of these guys-these guys with seperate lives. They don’t care about us. I love the movie Fever Pitch. Not because of the Red Sox, but because I see so many correlations between the way Jimmy Falon’s character and the way I feel. Or the way someone I know feels. At one point, one of schoolteacher Jimmy’s kids looks at him, and says something along the lines of “…you love the Red Sox, but have they ever loved you back?” David Ortiz does not love you. Manny Ramirez does not love you (well, sometimes he does, sometimes he doesn’t…) Co-captains Danny Briere and Chris Drury left you captainless. And it hurts. It fucking hurts. But dammit, the Red Sox did love you back one time; in 2004, and that feeling, that internal shiver, is what you live for. The players are individuals, sure…but I know you’ve heard the overused Herb Brooks expression “you play for the name on the front, not the name on thed back”. And for the most part, the players do. Come offseason, they’re individuals again, and if they want to leave, fine, we don’t need them. We have our name on the front. And if bandwagoners want to leave, fine, maybe my ticket price will go down. I might live here: http://youtube.com/watch?v=Wii6vHBSiP4 , but I also live here: http://youtube.com/watch?v=kWp-flMnLMQ&mode=related&search= .

The WNY area loves sports. It does. And maybe we don’t have that major championship, but we have pride. We keep coming back. Party in the Plaza for the Sabres home opener? Looked pretty packed to me. I, on the other hand, spent $130 to sit by myself. And I’ll be damned if I didn’t cry when the banners fell. I’ll be damned if I don’t feel a little emotional thinking about it. And I’ll be damned if I don’t get goosebumps every single time I hear the cut to the live feed in miracle. Hockey is at my core, it really is. I’m just trying to make room for some football. (there is already a little room for baseball and tennis…)

So, from the unassuming mind of a (arguably) new Bills fan: I’m happy. I think the area was showcased nicely, I think special teams and defense were spot on, and I think we just need to sort out some offense. Trent Edwards may be the messiah everyone in WNY is looking for. He’s a kid. Tony Romo lost his first monday night football game. And he, along with Tom Brady only had time to chine when a starter was injured. Incoincidently, the starter was Drew Bledsoe, leading some to name the phenomenon the “Drew Bledsoe effect.” Or so I hear. Maybe we should look into Drew Bledsoe. Oh wait. Actually, Trent Edwards is post Bledsoe, maybe it just took a while to sink in.

Coming back to the Patriots though, the Bills used to spank them. Now, the Tom Brady era is in full effect, and the Patriots are fine. But the Bills are fine too. Red Sox fans waited almost 90 years. I feel WNY is in pretty deep with this waiting stuff, and it’s only a matter of time before something gives. And I’m going to be there. And so will you. I’d much rather be a Bills fan, with emotions and scars running deep than a corporate in New England, with a strand of pearls and a blackberry taking my attention away from the game. Bills fans are Bills fans first, and football fans second. That is what I see, anyway. The other thing they have is hope. Unrelentless, undying hope. Because sometimes hope is all you have. I know you’ve all seen this before, as per the Shawshank Redemption.

Red: “Hope is a dangerous thing. Hope can drive a man insane.”

Andy: “Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.”

So, I guess maybe WNY is in a coma, and we need to keep visiting, and keep reading…and with enough faith and hope, maybe someone will wake up.